Funnel cakes are a Pennsylvania Dutch bakery confectionary, traditionally formed by a homemaker pouring a batter including wheat flour, eggs, milk, leavening, salt and other materials into a skillet containing heated cooking oil. As the batter is dispensed through the funnel, the funnel is moved over the skillet so that a strand of the batter is formed in the skillet. The funnel is moved over the skillet in any desired free form so the strand forms an interlocking design, such as a spiral, star or web. The batter, as it cooks, swells to form a relatively flat cake, which is cooked on each side for approximately thirty seconds until it is evenly browned. The resulting funnel cake is removed from the skillet and frequently confectionary sugar, syrup, ice-cream or other materials are added.
Funnel cakes, with expanding popularity, have been commercialized into dry mix form. The dry mix typically includes wheat flour, sugar, dried whole egg, non-fat dry milk, leavening, salt and artifical flavor, but does not include yeast nor shortening, ingredients also missing from the traditionally formed funnel cakes. To the dry mix is added a measured quantity of water or other suitable, similar liquid. The dry mix-water mixture is mixed to form a batter that can be dispensed into the skillet by utilizing a funnel. In addition, the batter can be formed in and dispensed from a pitcher having a long spout. The batter is poured through the spout into a skillet or other cooking vessel containing heated cooking oil; a particularly suitable pitcher is disclosed in my U.S. Pat. No. 4,230,238. The funnel cake product has been cooked and sold in this manner at retail, for food service use. Alternatively the batter can be dispensed from a squeeze bottle, as disclosed in my co-pending application, Ser. No. 398,233, filed July 14, 1982, entitled "Apparatus For And Method Of Making Funnel Cakes".
Funnel cakes are traditionally a breakfast type food, similar to pancakes or waffles. However, funnel cakes have not usually been sold in restaurants, for breakfast use. Many restaurants, particularly fast food restaurants, are prime candidates to sell funnel cakes for breakfast and other meals, as well as snack purposes, because such restaurants have deep fat fryers of the type employed for frying french fried potatoes in a wire mesh basket. Because french fried potatoes are not cooked during the entire day and do not occupy the deep fat fryers all of the time, the deep fat fryers could be employed economically for cooking funnel cakes. Because some deep fat fryers include sufficient space for two adjacent wire mesh baskets, only one of which is needed for french fried potatoes, there is unused space that can be used to make funnel cakes. However, deep fat fryers as presently constituted are not suitable for making funnel cakes because the fryers are located in a vat having a height of 6 inches or more, containing a hot cooking oil bath having a similar depth.
To make a funnel cake properly, the funnel cake must be poured into a pan having hot liquid cooking oil to a depth of between 1/2 to 2 inches, preferably approximately 11/2 inches. The maximum 2 inch depth is necessary to assure that when the batter is continuously poured into the oil, a floating unitary mass is formed in the oil. If the hot liquid cooking oil has a depth in excess of 2 inches, the batter does not form a unitary mass because it has a tendency to striate, i.e., to form a number of different, generally parallel layers at different depths in the oil. The striation causes the funnel cake batter to form a number of individual strands or globules, rather than a unitary mass. Such striation is prevented by limiting the depth of the hot liquid cooking oil to 2 inches because at that depth range, the batter as it is poured into the pan hits the bottom of the pan and then rises in the oil to a level to form a unitary mass. The 1/2 inch minimum cooking oil depth prevents the batter from sticking to the bottom of a cooking vessel in which the funnel cake is being prepared.
Conventional deep fat fryers are also not completely suited for cooking funnel cakes because the funnel cakes have a tendency, as they are cooked, to expand. Such expansion may prevent formation of a unitary mass. The dimensions of generally available deep fat fryers are such that the batter, as it cooks, is likely to expand excessively, causing the finished product to be susceptible to breakage. It is, thus, necessary to confine the funnel cake, as it is being cooked.
It is, accordingly, an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved method of and apparatus for cooking funnel cakes.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a new and improved method of and apparatus for cooking funnel cakes by using deep fat fryers.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a method of and apparatus for cooking funnel cakes in restaurants having deep fat fryers that are used for cooking various foods during non breakfast periods, and wherein the fryers can be modified for cooking funnel cakes during breakfast periods.
A further object of the invention is to provide an apparatus for and method of cooking funnel cakes in a deep fat fryer such that the funnel cake batter, when cooked, forms a unitary mass.